Best practices will be crucial to enthroning a digital banking system in Nigeria, and according to experts, would enable players’ to be committed to repositioning the country’s financial landscape.

This idea came to the fore at the weekend in Lagos, when Inlaks, a leading system integrator in sub-Saharan Africa, in partnership with Temenos, the global banking software company, HID, an American manufacturer of secure identity solutions, and the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), brought stakeholders together at a forum for financial players.

The forum highlighted how digital technology is reshaping the banking industry, and provided in-depth insights into various market trends and advances both locally and globally.

Presenting a keynote with the theme: “Banking in the Digital Age”, Deputy Director, Other Financial Institutions Supervision (OFIS) Department, CBN, Adedeji Adesemoye, identified fundamental approaches that banks can use to enhance their digital capabilities.

Adesemoye itemised financial inclusion and digitisation as a means that can foster innovation across products, business models and allow straight-through processing that can automate and digitise a number of repetitive, low-value, and low-risk processes.

He further stressed the need for banks to have a vision of their future technology infrastructure, and a well-defined corporate culture as major factors that determine whether a bank is successful in this age.

Batavia said Temenos also provides innovative software solutions to banks of all sizes, “all around the world, helping them to thrive in the digital banking age,” through building, delivering and supporting financial institutions with the world’s best packaged, upgradeable and open banking software.

In a joint presentation by the trio of Kingsley Oseghale, General Manager, Enterprise Business; Tope Dare, Executive Director, Sales & Strategy (Infrastructure Business Division); and Adeyemi Ademiluyi, Cyber security Manager, at Inlaks, argued that there was no way that the issue of cybersecurity could be left unattended to when discussing banking in the digital age.

Ademiluyi said: “There are opportunities in this digital era, but there are also real threats in digital banking and it is important that organisations stay safe. Every day, attacks are launched at digital companies and these attacks are becoming more sophisticated.

The ‘cyber thieves’ are becoming more creative and innovative in their approach.

Organisations spend thousands and millions of dollars trying to put in place security software and infrastructure to limit these threats. We have been helping our clients to stay safe using multiple steps which will keep them ahead of cyber thieves.”

Dare, on his part, said the company had partnered with credible companies, like Temenos and HID to provide a security infrastructure that can help digital banking platforms mitigate the problem of cyber theft.